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Solomon's temple

Hebrew בַּיִת. Literally "a house". Also called The first temple, Yahweh's house, Temple, bayit.

The first temple in Jerusalem: a stone house sixty cubits long, twenty wide and thirty high, the tabernacle's plan at twice the size.

Length
26.7–27.4 m (87.5–90 ft). Defined as 60 cubits. Inherits the disagreement over the cubit.
Width
8.89–9.14 m (29.2–30 ft). Defined as 20 cubits. Inherits the disagreement over the cubit.
Height
13.3–13.7 m (43.8–45 ft). Defined as 30 cubits. Inherits the disagreement over the cubit.

Solomon begins it in the fourth year of his reign and finishes it seven years later, and the text calls it simply Yahweh's house. It is precise about the size: sixty cubits by twenty by thirty, with a porch across the front and an inner sanctuary twenty cubits every way, a perfect cube overlaid with gold, where the ark was placed under the cherubim. Its floor plan doubles the tabernacle's tent, sixty by twenty against thirty by ten. Chronicles gives the porch a height of a hundred and twenty cubits, which many readers take to be a copying error. It stood for nearly four centuries, until Babylon burned it. The temple of the gospels is its successor, rebuilt after the exile and enlarged by Herod, which is why John can say it had taken forty-six years to build.

The tabernacle and Solomon’s temple, in plan Floor plans drawn to one scale, east to the right. The tabernacle's court of linen hangings, 100 by 50 cubits, with its gate on the east, the bronze altar, and the tent, 30 by 10 cubits, with the most holy place at its west end and the ark inside. Beside it, Solomon's temple, 60 by 20 cubits with a porch across the front and the inner sanctuary at the west end, with the tabernacle's tent outlined inside it: the temple doubles its plan. A tennis court is drawn to the same scale for size. the tabernacle’s court: 100 × 50 cubits44.5–45.7 m × 22.2–22.9 m146–150 ft × 72.9–75 ftthe tent: 30 × 10 cubits13.3–13.7 m × 4.45–4.57 mreckoned from its boards; the goldsquare is the most holy placethe bronze altargateSolomon’s temple: 60 × 20 cubits, and a porch26.7–27.4 m × 8.89–9.14 m87.5–90 ft × 29.2–30 ftthe tabernacle’s tent, to the same scale:the temple doubles ita tennis court, for size020 meast is to the right; both entrances face it
The court and the tent are given in Exodus 26–27, the temple in 1 Kings 6. The tent’s size is reckoned from its boards, and its place in the court and the altar’s are the usual reconstruction, since the text gives no distances between them. Solomon’s house keeps the tent’s plan at twice the size, with the most holy place still at the west end.

Where it appears

See also

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